New sabotage angle to Jaipur IOC oil inferno

CBI and the police had initially ruled out any foul play but are now doing a rethink.

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Sudhanshu Mishra

Jaipur

November 9, 2009

UPDATED: November 9, 2009 09:17 IST

The Jaipur police and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) have strong reasons to believe that the inferno at the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) depot that broke out on October 29 could have been a case of sabotage.

The intention apparently was to hush up fuel pilferage from the depot involving officials of both the IOC as well as the adjoining depot of the Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL).

Both the police and the Jaipur office of the CBI had initially ruled out any possibility of sabotage for reasons best known to them.

Now, they seem to have second thoughts following a spot inspection by experts of the Forensic Science laboratory (FSL) on Friday and Saturday.

The CBI's Jaipur office had in fact arrested seven persons, including two IOC supervisors, in August for fuel pilferage from the IOC depot and confiscated 180 kilolitres of fuel in a month. Jaipur CBI spokesperson Alok Gupta said that the pilferage of such massive volume of fuel was not possible without seniors noticing.

The accused in the pilferage racket had used the premises of the nearby HPCL depot, pointed out Gupta. "Following the decommissioning of the HPCL depot on August 22, the accused used to transfer fuel from the IOC depot to the HPCL containers and take it out whenever they wanted," he said.

Following a tip-off, HPCL officials "uncovered" the scam and tried to hush it up before the CBI began its probe.

Inspector general of police (Jaipur Range-1) B. L. Soni said arson and sabotage could have been a reason for the inferno in view of the ongoing CBI inquiry into the fuel pilferage, as some of those involved in the pilferage might have been trying to hush it up and cover up the fuel shortage.

Three days after the fire was finally put out, the police collected a large number of the IOC-related papers scattered around 5 km away from the depot. The police were trying to ascertain whether they were thrown away deliberately or had blown away with the wind and the smoke from the depot, sources said.

The FSL team, joined by the police, inspected various apparatus, including the valves and pipelines at the depot, for the second consecutive day on Saturday to ascertain the causes of the leakage that caused the massive fire.

The FSL team, sources said, found two valves opened instead of only one needed to open the oil pipeline or close it. The police noticed that the valves in the IOC containers which were connected to the pipeline were not operated according to the standard operating procedure, Soni pointed out.

Investigation also revealed that the first sign of leakage was noticed around 5 pm on October 29, the day of the accident. It is mandatory to report such leaks immediately but this was not done. Within an hour, the leak had spread, emitting a vapour cloud of fuel that eventually exploded and engulfed the entire depot with its 11 fuel storage containers.

Following primary investigation, the police said it seemed the on-duty officials on October 29 failed to handle the situation promptly. "They did not perform the drill needed to tackle the situation," a senior police officer said. The investigating team has also inspected the HPCL depot and its machinery.

The lone surviving witness, IOC technical officer Ashok Gupta, was recovering in a city hospital. He was the shift incharge on the fateful night. The police believe he would be able to throw more light on what had happened but were going slow in anticipation of his full recovery.

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